Pine Barrens Peat Water, Mullica River    cfe

Between drought and development, it is hard for others, even for New Jersey natives, to credit our slogan, “The Garden State.”

NJ WILD readers know, I celebrate New Jersey’s wild beauty wherever and whenever I can find it, even right in my own (near Rocky Hill) rocky hilly foresty yard.

But sometimes, I must go far afield, gulp great ‘draughts’ of New Jersey Beauty.

As. recently, to and from my cherished ‘Brigantine’ - Wildlife Refuge, otherwise known as Edwin B. Forsythe.

The blessings of visiting ‘the Brig’ are beyond measure, starting with the long silent even winding drive through the Pine Barrens to Smithville and Oceanville.  Due east of those tiny pre-Revolutionary towns stretches the 8-mile dike drive among bays and impoundments, rare birds at all times and in all seasons.

Come along with me on last week’s spur-of-the-moment, if not even desperate, flight to beauty.

Queen Anne’s Lace, Mullica River, Pine Barrens      cfe

Beyond the dock, fortunate kayakers make their way up the Mullica, without whose Revolutionary waters and watermen, we wouldn’t have a nation:

Mullica Kayakers,    cfe

Cloud-Studded Salinity-Managed Waters of Brigantine    cfe

FIDDLER CRABS, OUT FOR LOW-TIDE LUNCH, Brig     cfe

NEW JERSEY BEAUTY - CLOUD MAJESTY   Brig     cfe

There were great egrets everywhere, like archangels at the Nativity, as well as black-bellied and American golden plovers, ibis beyond counting, a few skimmers not skimming, and osprey families everywhere we looked — some feeding young, one ‘mantling ‘ - waving mature wings to cool the immature!

Successful Osprey Family, The Brig    cfe

Duck and First Marsh Mallows of the Season     cfe

Glossy Ibis and Marsh Mallow, Brig    cfe

Wild Flowers (water lilies and Sagittaria) and Cranberry Bogs Near Chatsworth, #563,

The Empty, Beauty-Bracketed Route Home     cfe

As you can see, beauty and wildness are with you every step of the way to and from ‘The Brig.’

(”The Pretty Way” will have no cars to speak of, even on major holidays.  Route 1 South to 295 South to Columbus Exit to 206 South to Carranza Road/Tabernacle to 532 (stop at Russo’s for fresh-made cider doughnuts and very local produce).  532 east to 563 South to (I forget the number -[579?]) left to New Gretna below Chatsworth  Route 9 South, moments on GSP, Exit 48 Smithville, back onto Route 9 South below Smithville to left turn to Forsythe Wildlife Refuge after fire station, Lily Lake Road. See Noyes Museum of Art while down there.  Eat breakfast at The Bakery in Smithville; any time at Smithville Inn, and Oyster Creek Inn at Leeds Point, if it’s open when you’re there…)

Summer’s Great Egret at ‘The Brig’  - viewed in February 2012    cfe

Your NJ WILD ‘reporter’ proved her passion for the wild yesterday.  A birding friend and I rode to the Brigantine Wildlife Refuge in the face of winds in the 40-50-mph range.  We knew birds wouldn’t be ‘up’ in such gusts and gales.  However, we could find snow geese, no matter what - and we’d both read the hotlines reporting ten tundra swans a-swimming…

There was only supposed to be 10% chance of precipitation.  En route, we drove through snow enough to require wipers.  Inky skies to the west could have presaged tornadoes or hurricane.  If you know birders, you know that we continued.

There may be nothing more thrilling then Pine Roads in snowfall.  The great privilege is being the only car on those stunning routes — #532 out of Tabernacle, #563 down through Chatsworth…

As though the pines themselves were holding up branches to say “Enough,” we were suddenly treated to dazzle-light through generosities of crisp green needles.  Light made its way even through oak leaves the hue of caramel.  Sacred sugar sand sifted and drifted along the sides of every roadway, (except that brief interruption of the GSP), so that our journey truly became destination.

Brig Vistas in Summer       cfe

Until, that is, we crossed the first bridge into the Brig.  Then the refuge and its creatures took center stage.

(This haven is the Edwin B. Forsythe Wildlife Refuge - named for a Republican who saved major swathes of forest and water in the southern and eastern reaches of our beleaguered state.)

In waters at entry four ring-necked ducks floated, then flew — more vivid than we had realized.  For the first time, we reconsidered our duck hierarchy of beauty.  For a few hours, yesterday, wood ducks took second place.

Wood Duck Splendor, Brenda Jones

Barely three car-lengths onto the Gull Pond Road, we were stopped in our tracks.  In a pine that holds summer’s black-crowned night herons, a pale form rearranged itself into a great blue heron.  It did not look happy in those winds that caused even the Prius to shudder.  My friend’s Swarovskis soon found another great blue form, tucked deep into a pine to our left.  When my far lesser binoculars could find it, shadow rendered this heron even more blue.  Something whizzed over our windshield - paper-clip legs out behind revealing a third great blue.  I don’t remember now how the fourth one materialized, but we were in a near superfluity of herons.

Miserable Heron in  Snow, Millstone River, Brenda Jones

I haven’t seen many around here in Princeton this winter– but Anne Zeman and I had been ‘given’ four herons here January 2.  That day, the fab four had been chased from piney haven by a feisty young fox.  No fox yesterday.  However, of all things, a great egret stood proudly among all the blues, whiter than the snow that had surrounded us an hour earlier.  February is not egret time!

Summer’s Great Egret,  Brenda Jones

Buffeted Heron, Spring 2011,   Brenda Jones

We pulled ourselves away from these wonders, down to the gull tower.  There was no climbing in gusts, which my Chicago sister reports soared to 61 mph not far north of us.  My friend and I could barely open the car doors against this form of wildness. But it was thrilling to be out in it.  Earlier, at the Visitor Center, this new hip and I had to jog against wind so strong it felt as though I could lean on it like a mattress.

But Mary had to get her scope on those tundra swans.  On another body of water, for comparison’s sake, we were given a pair of mute swans, orange beaks blinding in windswept light.  These two are paired, as are the ones in our Marsh of Hamilton/Trenton/Bordentown.  But the tundras floated as though on a bathtub, as one, all in a row.  Their beaks were purest black and spade-like.  Individually and collectively, the tunderas remained elegant and serene upon wind-pleated waters, although not so commanding as nearby mute swans.  In the foreground, a flotilla of coots enhanced the elegance quotient, in velvety formal attire, white beaks gleaming.

Coot in Millstone, Brenda Jones

I popped back into the car to escape the winds, as Mary focused her scope on the twenty tundras.

Suddenly, a large flat-winged bird was coming straight at me.   Its image filled the entire car window.  It was so close and so large, I was only aware of shape, and its harrier-like motion over water (not a typical place for the harrier).  Mary confirmed that this was no harrier.  Rather the American bald eagle. Virtually eye-to-eye, he and I.

Eagle Diving For Thanksgiving Dinner, Lake Carnegie - Brenda Jones

Only he seemed unfazed by those winds.  For long moments, he stayed virtually motionless, in the hover position we know so well in kingfisher and hummingbird.  But this hovering, especially when he lowered his landing gear, seemed of far greater duration.

Our Nation’s Symbol, Brenda Jones

Then the eagle landed (sorry about that) in a short bright green shrub.  Like a film star of my parents’ day, he studiously gave us his best profile.  There is no carat measurement sufficient to measure, let alone honor, such gold.  Over and over he posed as the Great Seal of the United States.

Then the eagle leapt into air, as if to say “WHAT wind?”.  He returned to harrier-mode over grasses, and abruptly ’stooped’.  Meaning, he’d found prey.  Whatever it was (likely rabbit), must have been hugely satisfying, for we were never to see ‘our’ eagle rise from its pink-gold wildly rippling dining room.

As Mary reluctantly drove on, we each marveled: “This whole trip was worth it for the eagle scenes alone!”

Red-Tailed Hawk along D&R Canal, Brenda Jones

Our next gift was a red-tail in a tree, head turned attentively toward where there had been an eagle.  I suddenly realized that a cluster of American crows had flown abruptly past, right before I’d come eye-to-eye with an eagle.  Crows are known to mob this raptor.  These crows were in pure flight mode in every sense of that phrase.

The stars of the day, however, glory-wise, were Northern pintails.  That chic sharp angle at the neck is really thin.  But in dazzle-light, we found their cravats nearly blinding.  The pintails were even beautiful upside-down.  They were everywhere along the impoundments.  Counting was out of the question.

Isolate images stand out even now - the great black-backed gull, nicknamed, ‘The Minister’, feasting on a live crab, morsel by morsel.  The crab writhing.

Sudden wind-driven incoming tide wrinkling the saltwater until it seemed furiously crumpled foil.

Brooding brackish impoundments to our left resembling lava, even to blue-black hues beneath the sunglinted waves.

In all that turbulent expanse, shovelers stood out as still points.  Vibrant rust-to-orange, blinding white and darkest forest green, there is no more handsome fellow than drake shovelers, — handsome as opposed to elegant, like the pintails, who looked dressed for an embassy ball.  Shovelers, with their almost comical spade beaks, usually are nervously working the bottoms of runnels at low tide, scooping up nourishment for all they are worth.

We noticed that Canada geese are still in flocks, not romantically paired (as were the mute swans).

Mute Swan in the Stony Brook, Brenda Jones

Miracles continued to appear.  More buffleheads than we could count, in open water between the Brig and Tuckerton.  Over and over, the little black and white bobbers were rendered nearly invisible by tumultuous waves.

Dapper Bufflehead, Princeton, Brenda Jones

There’s no such thing as enough buffleheads, so Mary and I continued, despite the gale, to the ineptly titled “Experimental Pond.”  If ever you’re going to find irresistible diving ducks, it’s there.  I went into jogging mode anew, after having struggled to open the car door against Nature herself.  All that I found were four Canada geese, so I jogged back again - exultant that this new femur knows how to do that.

Mary was outside the car, in the face of all that wind, calling out, ‘Eagle, eagle!”  Her wondrous optics had found our original monarch of a raptor high overhead, no more than a dot above.  We stood there until our faces were well sun-and-wind-burned, watching him play the wind.  Talk about mastery.

American Bald Eagle, Over Carnegie Lake, Brenda Jones

On the way home, we both wondered why everyone isn’t a birder.  To think that anyone could experience such a treasure hunt, a mere 80-or-so miles south and east of Princeton, anytime he or she wants.  All you have to do is take the Pineroads south, and live in a state that knows about preservation.

Support your local land trust, wherever you are.  Mine, of course, is D&R Greenway.  I and my new hip return there in the morning, for the first time since November 9 surgery, to take up my mission newly.  It’s never BEEN more URGENT!

Cape May Lighthouse, NJ

Titmouse in Snowstorm, Brenda Jones

NJ WILD readers know, my favorite time to be anywhere is off-season.  In 2009 I had chosen to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day at Cape May.

My key birding/hiking/art and travel buddy, Janet Black, and I had this urgent need to flee the commercial madness which had come to overwhelm this once sacred season.  The fiercest concern, on all channels during this week’s blizzard, was not health or safety - but o, dear! — people can’t get to the malls!  Christ was not born to turn balance sheets from red to black.

We went to seek the elemental, even the primal.

I, personally was starved for limitlessness.

We both needed birds, — handsome birds, large birds, unexpected birds, birds dealing boldly and successfully with elements, putting humans to shame.  Birds making us catch our breath over their beauty, their fearlessness, their deft way with the wind.  Somewhere out beyond the first lines of waves, long-tailed ducks were bobbing and feeding.  Sometimes, if we were very lucky, elegant gannets arrowed right over our heads, or threaded their way above the crests.

Yes, we knew the trails, the hot spots, from Sunset Beach to Cape May Point to Higbee Beach.  We’ve put in our time on and near the hawk watch platform, normally abuzz - it would be still for Christmas.

Cape May Bird Observatory post captures their Hawk Watch Platform post-blizzard

We knew where to hike (from the jetty to the light) in a benevolent season, when we were sometimes accompanied by ruddy turnstones, living mosaics hopping along beside us as we stride.

We knew where the peregrine stooped (’stooped’ is the birder’s word) upon tasty prey, from an anachronistic bunker to a freshwater pond, as sedate mute swans ignore the entire drama.

Killdeer and Snow

from Cape May Bird Observatory post, post-storm

We knew where monarchs clustered in autumn, on a shrub called “high tide plant.”  We had favorite dune trails where we’d seen loons visibly change their plumage before our eyes.

But neither of us knew what Christmas meant at New Jersey’s Cape, let alone what it means to the birds.

We packed foul weather gear - we’ve used it before for Cape May Birding Weekends of 20 mile an hour winds and I swear 20 degrees, although it couldn’t have been - it was the end of May…

We packed our binoculars and our Sibleys - well, they’re always in the trunk.  Being writers, books and notepads went first into those suitcases.  Janet’s memoir vied with her poetry.  My NJ WILD held pride of place - no competition for it, these days, not even from the poetry muse.

We both fled the Victorian, sought out the rustic, the local, and above all, the maritime and the avian.

Down at the southernmost tip of New Jersey, at the birds’ jumping-off place to cross the Delaware Bay, the prime activity would neither be shopping til you drop, nor counting down to Christmas.

Out on the windswept beaches, spirit would be near at hand.  Shore birds would do their Holy Ghost thing.

Though we did not see the Christmas star, something was being born.  I called it Hope.

�

This is the time of the fruition, then the end, of a great love.

Driving dappled lanes home tonight, far from the Pine Barrens, this poem came surging through, begging to be shared with NJ WILD readers.

Rejoice with me, even though this love was not to be durable.

Remember your own powerful loves…

IT ALL STARTED

when we came upon

carpets of stars

cranberries in flower

trembling white below

the ice blue sky

along the hard-packed dikes

slumbrous bees

formed golden pyramids

on gleaming amber boxes

dawn’s pollinators

here to burst all bonds

course among broad acres

of waving stamens

at day’s end we stood on tiptoe

plucking first blued berries

from among the mauve and pink

at the tips of overarching bushes

tucked among hollies and sheep laurel

through thickets and tunnels

we made our way to the sea

mouths awash in warm berries

CAROLYN FOOTE EDELMANN

Dike Road to Infinity, by Sharon Olds, Brigantine/Forsythe Wildlife Refuge

Multiple Views to South, Brigantine/Forsythe — Sharon Olds

See bottom of article re this week’s osprey chick rescue, thanks to Citizens United, re Fortescue on Delaware Bayshores.  If any of you are at ‘the Brig’ this week, I wish you’d report to me in comments on its many osprey nests.

Vigilant Osprey, Brigantine in May, cfe

NJ WILD readers know I used to write nature articles for the Packet, US 1, West Windsor-Plainsboro News, Jersey Sierran and New Jersey Countryside magazine.  For the magazine, an article,”Pinelands by Secret Roads”, was accompanied by a ‘box’ with the following information concerning birding gear.

If you’re nature-starved, as I am, as America fries this climate-changed July, one ideal jaunt is the Brigantine Wildlife Refuge, also called Forsythe Wildlife Refuge, at Smithville, north of Atlantic City. It’s ideal in this heat-wave because you can, in fact - for the birds’ sake, are encouraged to, STAY IN YOUR CAR.  You’ll be treated to rarities, from my most recent first sandhill-crane spotting to migratory flocks, –yes, certain long-legged shorebirds already flocking, to these protected reaches crucial to the Atlantic Flyway.

‘The Brig’ provides a shimmering eight-mile excursion, taken at 10 to 15 mph, along dike roads between impoundments of varying salinities.  The waters are managed so that aquatic plants can grow which provide nourishment and shelter for specific species of water birds.  ‘The Brig’ is particularly significant in spring and fall migration (the latter of which starts now.)

Across Absecon Bay, Atlantic City rises like Atlantis, and sometimes mercifully disappears in fog or blizzard…  remember blizzards?   Next to it is the inexplicable ever-whirring wind farm, smack in the middle of birds’ essential flyways.

Great Egret taking off at Brigantine, by Brenda Jones

Let Atlantic City jolt you into remembering the urgency of land preservation in our state.

Besides being beautiful, ‘The Brig’ is healthy and safe for birds on their critical journeys.  It will provide ideal habitat for you, too, in what Europeans call ‘The Dog Days.’  Turn them into ‘The Bird Days’ and watch rare shorebirds, ducks, waders and brilliant fliers such as the northern harrier, from the air-conditioned comfort of your car.

Even in the car, however, staying hydrated is key.  The hiker’s maxim is, “A pint an hour under 90; a quart an hour, over.”

Snowy Egret feeding at Brigantine, by Brenda Jones

When you are birding outdoors - the norm - (although I can now find the Princeton eagles from my car), here is the list of gear requested by New Jersey Countryside Magazine:

BIRDING GEAR

(the idea is comfort, safety and information/knowledge)

Binoculars or monocular; scope, if your lucky.  Light-gathering optics are ideal in early light and last…

Guidebooks: Roger Tory Peterson’s, Audubon Guides, all David Allen Sibley

Water: 1 pt./hour under 90 degrees; 1 quart/hr. over

Hat with beak (hides our eyes from the birds, remember – we appear to them as predators); hat also essential where ticks abide, as they can drop from trees.  Hat crucial in searing heat.

Muted clothing that does not rustle or squeak

Wind jacket, wind pants useful to have on hand - but that’s more crucial in winter birding.

Comfortable supportive water-resistant shoes/boots

“Wicking” socks with special padding at heel and foot

Long sleeves, left down (re ticks/Lyme disease)

Long pants tucked in to high socks (ditto)

Excellent insect repellant

Good regional maps - the best is available at Marilyn Schmidt’s Buzby’s General Store, at crossroads of 532 and 563 in Chatsworth, the heart of the Pine Barrens. My dear friend, Marilyn designed and publishes this map of South Jersey/Pinelands, and it’s taught me everything I know about back roads.  Her shop is full of guides to birds, plants, foods, lingo, history, churches and gravestones, the Jersey Devil, and so forth.  It is also for sale, so here’s your chance to leave hurly-burly behind and live in an historic haven.  (It’s on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places.)

BIRDING SITES in Pinelands

Brigantine, Edwin B. Forsythe Wildlife Refuge

Cape May

Route 47 around Goshen for eagles

Whitesbog bogs for herons, egrets, willets; winter’s tundra swans and snow geese

BEGINNER BIRDS to look for in the Pinelands

Great blue heron – tall, gangly, blue-grey, wades in water, swallows fish and other prey alive, head first

Egrets – rangy, tall, graceful, similar to herons, also wade, also swallow fish whole

Osprey – “fish hawk”– masked, look for untidy osprey nests on platforms; dives, grasps prey in talons, flies off with it, often carries to mate, to chicks, good luck to see “osprey packing a lunch”

Red-tailed hawk – raptor of edges – likes tall trees, broad fields, high flight and strong ‘stoops’ (swoops onto prey) look for sunlight in red tail

Brant – goose-like, elegant, black with white necklace, lovely murmuring sound

Ducks – every color, size, shape and variety at Brig and Smithville ponds, year-round

Osprey in flight, by Brenda Jones

FROM CITIZENS UNITED:

WHEN FAR IS NEAR:

April Scenes An Hour or So from Princeton

GO WITH FRIENDS

SHARE THE GAS

APPRECIATE NEW JERSEY

AND ALL OF THESE        PRESERVED!

Beach Where Piping Plovers Will Soon Nest

Cape May Easter 2011

Reading Richard Louv’s newest book, “The Nature Principle”, on the reunion of humans with nature, I come across a phrase that describes all these years of NJ WILD for the Princeton Packet:  NEAR IS THE NEW FAR.

Constable Scene - Spizzle Creek Bird Blind, Island Beach

This is the week I’ve first seen gas at $4 per gallon for regular, the week a friend paid $54 to fill her tank at a reasonable station.

Bluebell Enchantment April 30, Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve

All along, I’ve been insisting, New Jersey is rich in nearby natural beauty.  Maybe now, everyone will listen.  Adventure, remember, is right around the corner.

Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve is just across our beloved Delaware River, in Bucks County, just below New Hope.

Trillium/Bluebell Apotheosis - Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve today

Island Beach is less than 100 miles from here, just below Bay Head, Mantoloking and Lavalette.

Surf Fisherman, Bay Head, NJ - yesterday

Sandy Hook is just over a new bridge from Atlantic Highlands.

Tasha O’Neill and I in Bahrs (Restaurant) Window Across Bay from Sandy Hook -

two weeks ago

Each offers something rare, something I require - land’s end. Above all, Cape May is land’s end, for humans and for birds in migration.  Even the Cape May Bird Observatory is under 100 miles from my door.  I do all as day trips, but stayed this time in Cape May at the dear Jetty Motel - from which we can walk the beach at low tide to Cape May Lighthouse and the Hawk Watch Platform.

When we climbed these steps, ospreys were everywhere, fishing madly.

Kettles of vultures swirled overhead.

Kettles of vultures swirled overhead

one mute swan settled onto her nest in the reeds

full breeding plumage of one great egret lofted on the wind

and one peregrine zoomed

The peregrine falcon is the symbol of my April - for peregrinations are wanderings.  Short nearby nature journeys restore the soul, as I’ve written and written.  Richard Louv repeats and repeats this mantra.  Nature is no luxury.  It is essential.  The wild is neither remote nor extraneous.  It, too, is essential.  You can find wild nature in this state in a matter of minutes - even right along our Towpath.  But a sense of adventure remains imperative.

Wouldn’t you think I’d been far, far from here?  Instead:

Lenni Lenape Ancient Dugout Canoe

behind Bahrs Restaurant, on hem of Sandy Hook

wouldn’t you think I’d've been down South to find this sign last Friday?

FIRST ASPARAGUS OF THE SEASON

CAPE MAY COUNTY

We bought the asparagus from a woman who’d just picked it an hour ago on her farm.

Farmstand of Asparagus, Sweet Potatoes and Hydrangeas

Simple Seaside Supper at the Jetty Motel

New Friends Near Barnegat Bay, Island Beach - yesterday

New Fiddleheads Unfurl in Freshwater Pond near Ocean, Island Beach

Hopper Scene, Island Beach

Lobsterman’s Relic - Barnegat Bayshore, Island Beach

Island Beach is a true barrier beach, never built upon, pruned only by sea winds sometimes laden with salt, sand and/or snow.  History is everywhere there - fishermen, brigands, frigates, smugglers, Indians gathering clams, early whalers - as in Cape May.  Silence reigns at Island Beach.  True Pine Barrens plants burgeon.  Ferns unfurl magically in fresh peat water, only yards from the tumultuous ocean.

New Jersey WILD

On all of these nearby nature adventures, the spirit is renewed.

Majestic Trillium, Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve, this morning

NJ WILD readers know I tend to flee to ‘the Brig’ every chance I get, to find out from the birds what season it is.

A week ago, (yes, and again yesterday), I went to the wildlife refuge otherwise known as Edwin B. Forsythe, with friends new to the place.  Afterwards, I ‘turned them loose’ in the Pine Barrens and they sent back images to share.

‘The Brig’ can be ‘lovely, dark and deep’, if one is lucky enough to get in there before the sun rises, molten and seemingly dripping, out of the sea and over its bays and impoundments.

We were somewhat later both weeks, due to the essential stop at the Bakery, for hearty real breakfast (eggs that taste like egg, homemade, hand-seasoned sausage patties, endless mugs of fragrant steaming coffee by a window giving onto Tomaselli [Pinelands] Winery and the historic Smithville Inn.)

The greatest gift of ‘the Brig’, for me, is surprisingly not its birds.  Rather, limitlessness!

Dike Road Leads on Forever, by Sharon Olson

New Jersey readers will know that I am not making this up - that my drive down to meet fellow poet, Sharon Olson and her husband, Bill Sumner, at 9 a.m. was smothered in snow, flakes that quickened and thickened at the 206/70 traffic circle.

At ‘The Brig’, there was no more snow.  However:

Lone Snow Goose, by Sharon Olson

We thought we were seeing the last snow goose, However, we were wrong.  I heard the unmistakable musical muttering of hordes of snow geese.  Sure enough, we turned a corner to

White Flecks, Snow Geese by Thousands, practically all the way to Tuckerton -by Sharon Olson

What do they know (about lands north of here) that we do not know.

***

This weekend, I photographed two snow geese at the Brig - the latest ever:

Last of the Snow Geese, April 9, 2011   (cfe)

April 9 View from Gull Pond Tower    (cfe)

Another sense of Brigantine limitlessness.

Plus view of my trusty car, in which I proceed on all these jaunts, safely and comfortably, so I can share them with you.

Brooding Scene of Immature Red-tailed Hawk at Brig, April 9, (cfe)

From the Gull Pond Tower, we saw two (mute) swans at the nest, necks twining in a dance that leaves Swan Lake in the shadows.  It may well have been their courtship - an aspect of swan behavior about which I know zero.

I don’t have the kind of camera that can capture distant swans, nor even do a very good job of this majestic raptor.  He had all the presence of a golden eagle, clearly claiming this tree on Gull Pond Road, and the wide open spaces behind it over to Leeds Eco-Trail, for his new territory.  We hope spring brings him a mate for life, to share the Brig’s bounty, beauty and safety.  The red-tail opened and closed this week’s Brigantine adventure.

Great Egret in April Water by Sharon Olson

These images come to me through Sharon’s Picasa account — if anyone can tell me how to enlarge, I’ll be glad to learn.  It was a treat coming upon so many great egrets and some greater yellowlegs.  In each case, nature wasn’t generous enough to provide other versions (of egrets, of yellowlegs), so we could be absolutely sure of that ‘great’ appendage.  I did recognize the song of the greater yellowlegs, however, so we were pretty sure about these singletons on sandbanks.

Here’s Brenda Jones’ Brigantine Egret in Full Breeding Plumage at Brig

With great egrets, one can tell them from snowies because the ‘greats’ move with great serenity and dignity, as do great blue herons.  Snowies (whose distinguishing field mark yellow feet are usually hidden in water) move about nervously, stirring up bottom-dwelling nourishment with those ‘golden slippers.’

Three Views - The Mirror, the Impoundment, and (arrggh!) Atlantic City!  Sharon Olson

The rear-view mirror reminds me to look back, to marvel that these two new friends took to birding, well, like ducks to water.

Learning the vivid and unique shovelers early on, they took great delight in coming across and calling out the perfect name, from then on.  Shovelers are russet and green and blinding white, with spade-like beaks that literally shovel under low-tide mud to find their favorite delicacies.

We were treated to elegant, spiffy (quiet) brant, a red-winged blackbird or two (there should be hundreds, and even the females by now.  We did not see (they fan their tails) nor hear their territorial ‘okaleeeeee’ because there weren’t enough blackbirds worth territorializing about!

They were good about opening the bird tally (available in the Edwin B. Forsythe/Brig’s new Visitor Center, and vigorously remembering and marking each species seen.  They also took time to fill out the visitor query form, being from Connecticut.  Bill explained, “Figure they don’t get too many from our zip code…”

I’m not a lister (as in one who will go anywhere, pay any price, bear any burden to see and tally rarities).  I’m a thousand times more interested in finding creatures of New Jersey who migrate through our state, and the occasional accidental.  I’m not going to Costa Rica nor even to the Platte for cranes.  If I find them at the Brig, or in Salem and Cumberland, that’s another story!

Having new birders fill out the tally afterwards cements all they learned, giving them those species as permanent impressions for all time to come.

I’ll End with the Red Knots, by the late Theodore Cross

whose splendid waterbird images we showed at D&R Greenway Land Trust last year - only weeks after his impossible death

***

we should be seeing throngs of red knots soon

under the full moon of May

along all-too-slender Reed’s and other Delaware Bayshore beaches

but whom we may no longer see because we have destroyed their sole nourishment

the horseshoe crabs

Sharon Olson’s crisp view of the Horseshoe Crab Alert

at Tuckerton

at the end of Seven Bridges Road

near the Cousteau Society

in a former Coast Guard Building

***

if enough of those horseshoe crab signs are posted and heeded

the knots and the turnstones could return

***

in the meantime, knot populations are down 75%

because of human greed

Only Connect is a mandate I usually honor.

I’ll alter it on this subject:

ONLY PRESERVE!

NJ WILD readers know how very much I celebrate any aspect of wild in our beleaguered, overpopulated state.  As you have read my recent post re polar bears, don’t think bears are uncommon in wild New Jersey.  Thank Heaven!

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My heart rejoiceth that, in recent years, bears have been seen in the Pine Barrens, near Chatsworth.  I well know the three roads where the sightings happened, experiencing delightful frissons whenever I pass those road signs, realizing I am in 21st Century ‘bear country’. Those woods belong to them, and more power TO them!

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What could be more bear-able than the Pine Barrens?  And yet, for all my longing, I’ve not seen in a bear in our state.

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You haven’t had a poem from me in quite awhile.  The world situation makes me want to wail,  Not only the world, but prose is too much with us!

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Remember, always, do whatever you can to save habitat wherever you are.  Not only wild creatures - poor indoored humans require wildness!  Here, you know, your preservation center is D&R Greenway Land Trust.

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This poem was given to me in a potent year.  It was inspired by an ancient book on nature in the New World.  I share it with you, to remind you just what WILD really means! 

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If I ever publish a book of the 2001 poems, its title shall be, “Most Fierce in Strawberry Time,” from this poem.

 Bears, They Be Common…

                                    “…for bears, they be common, being a great black kind of bear

                                    which be most fierce in strawberry time…”  William Wood, 1630

so early English readers

learn of wildlife in our land:

of squirrels so troublous to corn

that husbands (Wood means farmers)

carry their cats to the cornfields

hearns are herons, eel-devouring

eagles known as gripes

wolves bear no joint from head to tail

none but Indians may catch beaver

to hunt turkey, follow tracks in snow

but skip cormorants – rank and fishy –

owls taste better than partridge

Wood limns the Indian game:

riding the bear over

watery plain, until

he can bear him no longer

then engaging in a cuffing match

Wood gives short shrift to omens

save cranes in faminous winters

in my starveling time

a Nebraska sandhill crane’s been sighted

in nearby Lawrenceville

yet I cannot sight

my own rare Love

whose first eagle we discovered

gripping a glowering pine

after tracking the great hearns

with and without eels

we were untroubled

by jointless wolf, fishy cormorants

at dusk we would ride the black bear

over meadow and plain

kicking with eager heels

as he splashed into inky bogwater

we held no cuffing match

yet he is elusive as Wood’s beaver

cannot be tracked, even in freshest snow

now I shall be most fierce

in strawberry time

                                                                        CAROLYN FOOTE EDELMANN

                                                                        March 10, 2001

Historic D&R Canal Towpath, Haven of Beauty, Source of Water

A national organization just sent a bulletin of good news for our environment, all too scarce in MY book!

In fact, among all the ‘Talking Heads” to whose palaver I was subjected this week, I heard the word ‘environment’ but once, in a tragically dismissive tone.

Our Congressman, Rush Holt, is a friend of the environment without peer.  As a naturalist and conservationist, I am profoundly relieved that he won this, his only narrow victory in all these terms.

While thankful to learn the news they conveyed, I felt compelled to write back to the national organization, alerting them to our Congressman Rush Holt’s ENVIRONMENTAL VIGILANCE in our state, in the Capitol. I share some of my response with NJ WILD readers.

As I bolded line after line in Rush’s web-page on environmental matters, –even I, loyal constituent so long as I have known this man–, learned ways in which our Rush Holt tends to Nature.

It is particularly significant that this former rocket scientist continues to instruct Washington to base environmental decisions upon sound science, not upon politics, not in reaction to special interest groups who continually despoil our land.

What I treasure about Rush is that he’s out there noticing what’s wrong, facing problems, solving problems, not merely reacting/vouchsafing sound bites, as do so many politicians…

Lavalette, New Jersey: Calm After Storm

You’ve read my anguished posts and my Packet article on the peril of birds in the wake of the BP disaster in the Gulf.  (from his web-site) Rep. Holt has voted against allowing potentially disastrous oil drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). He also has cosponsored OCEANS-21, comprehensive legislation that would develop a national policy to ensure the health of our nation’s oceans for future generations.

He weaves the young into his work:  Holt is a founding member and co-chair of the Children’s Environmental Health Caucus, which aims to raise awareness of environmental issues that affect health, particularly that of children.

(from his web-site) On May 14, 2009, the House of Representatives passed Holt’s Green Schools initiative as part of the School Modernization Bill. Natural Resources Committee

For this alone, I’d have voted for Rush:  Rep. Holt is a strong supporter of the Endangered Species Act and has consistently opposed attempts to weaken this law.

And this:  Rep Holt is committed to the preservation of America’s natural treasures, including its parks. Recently, he helped pass the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (H.R. 146), historic legislation that combines more than 160 individual measures. Among its many provisions, the bill includes new wilderness designations, wild and scenic rivers, National Park units, hiking trails, heritage areas, water projects, and historic preservation initiatives.

And this:  Rep. Holt does all in his power to oppose the destruction of environmentally fragile wilderness areas.

When I think of Rush, I experience him as listener – need I remind how rare that quality is in politicians in our time?

Our Congressman is also known for his strong historic perspective, terrifically important in this, our most populated state, where not even the events without which we would not be/have a nation, do not effectively protect sites where these events transpired.

Rush remembers and dynamically teaches the remarkable truth:  Ours is the state in which the highest percentage of successful Revolutionary War battles took place, –two in nearby Trenton and the significant one here in Princeton on January 3, 1777.

How many realize that that sacred battlefield could be developed even now by of all entities, the Institute for Advanced Studies?

Rush also knows that lands held open for historic purposes also protects and enhances life chances for native species.

History & Beauty - Historic Batsto Preserve

Pine Barrens of New Jersey - Former Iron Forge Town

His commitment to clean water is vital, as our Canal serves the water needs of millions.  Rush is well aware that New Jersey is the ONLY state with THREE coastlines - Atlantic, Delaware Bay and Delaware River. He is determined to maintain these treasures at the highest level, not only because of tourism dollars, but due to their essentiality to humans and native species on all levels.

Rush remembers, reminds others, and acts.  All that, and he writes personal thank you’s, even for my minuscule contributions.

From Congressman Rush Holt’s website page on Environment:  http://holt.house.gov/ Issues - Environment:

John F. Kennedy said in March 1961, ‘It is our task in our time and in our generation to hand down undiminished to those who come after us, as was handed down to us by those who went before, the natural wealth and beauty which is ours.’” –

Rush Holt Rep. Rush Holt has stood up for our nation’s environmental crown jewels, and is committed to safeguarding our National Parks and Preserves. He supports efforts to clean up our air, land, and water, and to preserve open space.

A member of the House Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition, he is a leader in promoting environmentally sound alternative energy sources that do not harm our environment. For his work, Rep. Holt has earned a 100 percent lifetime rating from the League of Conservation Voters.

Throughout his career, Rep. Holt has been a strong advocate for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) and its State Assistance program, which provides matching funds to states and communities to preserve open spaces. Early in his career, he was able to restore the state-side grant portion of the program, and he has since fought to retain and increase funding for it.

In the 110th Congress, Rep. Holt led a bipartisan coalition that helped secure $125 million for the LWCF and $25 million for the state-side grant portion. He is leading the effort to secure LWCF in the current Congress as well. The LWCF State Assistance program has aided local recreation projects in over 98% of all U.S. counties, including the preservation of over 73,000 acres of land in New Jersey alone. This is land that otherwise may have been developed for private use or otherwise rendered unusable. Due to the crucial work done by the LWCF, Rep. Holt has fought for full LWCF funding every year.

In July, Rep. Holt voted for and the House passed the Consolidated Land, Energy, and Aquatic Resources Act (CLEAR Act). In addition to fully funding the Land and Water Conservation Fund, this bill would raise operations standards on offshore drilling, making it safer for workers, as well as for our environment.

Northern Gannet at Cape May -
CMBO Picture –

One of most devastated birds during and after BP Oil Catastrophe in Gulf

In light of the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, the CLEAR Act adopts a provision written by Rep. Holt to hold oil companies accountable for the damage they inflict, should an accident occur. The bill is currently awaiting approval from the Senate.

Black Skimmer Glory by Brenda Jones

Bird deeply endangered by oil in water - as it skims waves to feed on resident fish

Rep. Holt supports states’ rights to lead the way on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles. He has supported legislation to allow states such New Jersey to create stronger regulations regarding vehicle emissions.

Rep. Holt strongly supports efforts to protect the Clean Water Act. He has cosponsored legislation that would reestablish the original intent of Congress in the 1972 Clean Water Act, ensuring that it applies to all water of the United States.

He also supports efforts to fully fund the Clean Water and Drinking Water State Revolving Fund.

Holt also is a founding member and co-chair of the Children’s Environmental Health Caucus, which aims to raise awareness of environmental issues that affect health, particularly that of children.

On his web-site, you can read Rep. Holt’s work on clean energy, including his efforts to increase automobile fuel efficiency standards for the first time in nearly 30 years.

Rep. Holt supports the “polluter pays” principle that the financial burden to clean up toxic pollution at Superfund sites should not fall on the backs of taxpayers. Congress created the Superfund in 1980 to clean up the nation’s worst toxic waste sites. Congress placed the financial onus for cleanups on polluting corporations. [This system worked as it was intended until 1995 when the 105th Congress let the Superfund revenue authority expire.]

Superfund still had funding until the Fiscal Year 2003 budget. Yet, the Bush Administration failed to request renewal of the Superfund taxes in any subsequent budget, resulting in the Superfund running dry. This has stalled cleanup efforts in Superfund sites throughout the country, including in Marlboro, NJ, which had waited for the clean up of the Imperial Oil Company site for more than 25 years, until finally receiving approximately $25 million for cleanup from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009. Rep. Holt continues to work to reinstate the Superfund tax on corporate polluters.

Rep. Holt has led the effort in Congress to preserve historic lands, as he believes that preserving historic spaces is essential to educating the current generations and future generations and about our rich cultural heritage. This year, he reintroduced the Revolutionary War and War of 1812 Battlefield Protection Act, legislation that would help preserve open spaces by authorizing additional funding to protect historic sites dating from these two wars.

Pre-Revolutionary Blue Mill, Blue Mill Pond, Walnford Village NJ

Additionally, in 2007 Rep. Holt secured $150,000 in federal funding for the Crossroads of the American Revolution National Heritage Area, which he helped to create in 2006. The Crossroads of the American Revolution highlights the role of New Jersey during the American Revolution and brings protection to many historic landmarks, including battlefields, lighthouses, mills, wells and the other Revolutionary War area sites in New Jersey. Crossroads of the American Revolution is headed by D&R Greenway Trustee Cate Litvack, who has become a friend and member of my Willing Hands Committee at the Land Trust, regularly arriving early for events to greet our guests.

Representing a state that is highly dependent on the ocean for its economy, tourism, and recreation, Rep. Holt is committed to ensuring that our coasts and oceans are clean.

Rep. Holt has voted against allowing potentially disastrous oil drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). He also has cosponsored OCEANS-21, comprehensive legislation that would develop a national policy to ensure the health of our nation’s oceans for future generations.

Where History and Waters Meet

Calling to Migrant Birds…

Cape May Light and Ocean Beach in Winter

Cape May Bird Observatory Photo

In January 2009, Rep. Holt reintroduced the School Building Enhancement Act, legislation that would help schools implement energy saving measures to reduce their energy costs. Energy bills are the second-highest operating expenditure for schools after personnel costs, with the annual spending by schools on energy at $8 billion in 2007. Holt’s bill would authorize $6.4 billion over five years for school construction, including funding to help schools become more energy-efficient.

On May 14, 2009, the House of Representatives passed Holt’s Green Schools initiative as part of the School Modernization Bill. Natural Resources Committee.

WILD (literally! & SCENIC DELAWARE RIVER, Brenda Jones

As a member of the House Committee on Natural Resources, Rep. Holt has worked to preserve America’s natural treasures, including its parks. Recently, he helped pass the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (H.R. 146), historic legislation that combines more than 160 individual measures. Among its many provisions, the bill includes new wilderness designations, wild and scenic rivers, National Park units, hiking trails, heritage areas, water projects, and historic preservation initiatives. The bill preserves New Jersey’s heritage as one of the leaders of the Industrial Revolution by creating the Paterson Great Falls National Historic Park and the Edison National Historic Park.

Rep. Holt has led efforts to oppose the destruction of environmentally fragile wilderness areas, including: In 2007, Rep. Holt led an effort, with 86 of his colleagues, to urge the Secretary of the Interior to oppose increased snowmobile use – which can damage the air and land - in Yellowstone National Park.

In December 2007, Rep. Holt spearheaded a successful effort, with 57 other Members of Congress, asking the Obama administration to overturn a last-minute decision by the Bush administration to auction off pristine public land in Utah’s Wilderness to oil and gas companies.

In 2007, Rep. Holt successfully offered an amendment to the Hardrock Mining and Reclamation Act that would ensure that national parks are protected from the hazardous byproducts of hardrock metal mining.

Rep. Holt opposes proposals to drill for oil within sensitive environments like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He does not believe that we should harm irreparably the nation’s remaining wilderness in order to produce oil that will not meet the demand for energy.

Rep. Holt believes it is important for the federal government to designate and protect critical habitats that are vital to the continued survival of endangered and threatened species.

He strongly supports allowing scientists - not politicians - to identify what is needed to enhance and de-list endangered species. Holt is working to strengthen the Endangered Species Act and has participated in a number of hearings on this issue as a senior member of the House Committee on Natural Resources.

Fox on Ice, Carnegie Lake, Brenda Jones

Rep Holt believes that the humane treatment of animals is a mark of civilized society.Because of his efforts on behalf of animal rights, Rep. Holt was awarded an A+ from the Humane Society Legislative Fund in 2008.

Rep. Holt has cosponsored legislation to prohibit the use of birds in animal fighting, to ban the riding of captive elephants in road shows, and to require wounded livestock to be humanely euthanized, rather than be left to suffer a slow and painful death.

Rep. Holt is a strong supporter of the Endangered Species Act and has consistently opposed attempts to weaken this law.

Rep. Holt has introduced the Fox-Penning Prohibition Act, legislation which would prohibit the transport of foxes and other animals for the purposes of “wildlife penning.” “Wildlife penning” is an inhumane treatment of animals by which they are put in fenced enclosures where wild animals are ripped apart by packs of dogs in competitive animal fights — they are torn apart by dogs in an escape-proof enclosure. “I have introduced legislation to stop this practice by outlawing the transport of animals for the purposes of fox penning.”

NJ WILD readers know that I spend a good part of my life at D&R Greenway Land Trust, where I do what it takes to bring superb regional artists to our nature-themed art exhibitions.

D&R Greenway’s Johnson Education Center - 1900 restored Robert Wood Johnson Working Barn

I began and sustain our Willing Hands Volunteer programs (www.drgreenway.org), to assist with mailings of invitations and newsletters and appeal letters and to help put on wine and cheese receptions for art opening and simpler receptions accompanying science programs keyed to each art show.

(JOIN US October 1 for the next Artists’ Reception - on Salem County in the Delaware Bayshore region, 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.  Free and open to the public - just call 609-924-4646 to register.)  The art of Salem/Mannington ranges from paintings through sculpture to fine art photography, with a rare and prize-winning decoy exhibition on loan.

All art is for sale, (many sold at our recent Gala), with a proportion of the proceeds supporting D&R Greenway’s Preservation and Stewardship Mission.

I have the images of the Salem art at work - will have to send home to share with NJ WILD Readers.

But since, thanks to preservation and restoration of habitat Salem County is rich in birds, especially raptors, I’ll give you this from Rod MacIver of Heron Dance on-line magazine.  The excellence, drama and evocation of nature of this vivid scene  will surround you on all sides at D&R Greenway, as the art remains on the walls of our circa-1900 barn through October 15. Come business hours of business days, calling to be sure our Marie L. Matthews Galleries are not rented at the time of your arrival.

Here is WATCHING, by Rod MacIver

Salem County has our state’s Highest Concentration of nesting American Bald Eagles